Contents

Plot

Phoebe brings in her late mother's Christmas memorial candy dish, shaped like a skull. Ben stays with Ross for the holidays who intends to teach his son about their Jewish heritage. He feels Ben is only exposed to Christmas traditions. Ross certainly makes his mark on Ben but the idea of a year without Santa sounds like a serious punishment. Phoebe finds out the renovations on her apartment are finished, and she's afraid that Rachel is too happy living with Joey and won't want to move back to Phoebe's place, so the gives Joey gifts intended to drive Rachel away. First she gives him drums, but Rachel seems to love them. Then, when that doesn't work, she gives Joey a tarantula, which scares Joey but not Rachel who had one as a kid (Which was eaten by her cat, which killed the cat itself). Chandler's wait for a restaurant table means he might miss a theater performance; tipping the host doesn't work either as he can't find the paper money. Ross, wants to surprise Ben but can't rent any Christmas suit this late, so he invents Santa's Tex-Mex friend: the Holiday Armadillo. The Armadillo explains about Hanukkah, the Festival of Lights but Chandler appears as Santa to help out Ross. Ross however was really connecting with Ben so asks Chandler to leave, until Monica asks him to keep the suit 'for later'! Rachel assures Phoebe she still wants to live with her and the two visit the renovated apartment, but it has been turned into a single-bedroom place. As a result, Rachel decides to continue living with Joey while Phoebe moves back in.

Supporting Cast

Crew

Goofs

When Ross is on the couch telling Ben about Hanukkah, Ben's hair varies from shot to shot. In the first shot it's flat and in the next shot it's spiked up at the front. His hair stays spiked up for a few shots and then returns to flat.

When the conversation between Ross and Ben ends, Ross helps him off the sofa, however in the next shot Ben is sitting back on the sofa.

At the end of the scene, Ben looks straight into the audience.

In this episode Chandler fails everytime he tries to slip money, even though he did it perfectly when he and Joey impersonated Richard after he taught them the trick in season 2 in The One Where Old Yeller Dies. It's possible that he forgot about the trick and that Richard did it until Monica mentioned it in this episode.